The Sea-Side Cave

^{“A bird of the air shall carry the voice, and that which hath wings shall tell the matter.”}

At the dead of night by the side of the Sea

I met my gray-haired enemy,—

The glittering light of his serpent eye

Was all I had to see him by.

At the dead of the night, and stormy weather

We went into a cave together, –

Into a cave by the side of the Sea,

And—he never came out with me!

The flower that up through the April mould

Comes like a miser dragging his gold,

Never made spot of earth so bright

As was the ground in the cave that night.

Dead of night, and stormy weather!

Who should see us going together

Under the black and dripping stone

Of the cave from when I came alone!

Next day as my boy sat on my knee

He picked the gray hairs off from me,

And told with eyes brimful of fear

How a bird in the meadow near

Over her clay-built nest had spread

Sticks and leaves all bloody red,

Brought from a cave by the side of the Sea

Where some murdered man must be.